Ophiuchus
by abbzeh
Summary: He created the stars, and nothing can take that away from him, not Heaven and not Hell and not God's ineffable plan


Author's note: so I've never written anything for Good Omens before, but I just felt like it today. I don't know how this turned out, but I tried.

* * *

Sometimes, when he's feeling particularly melancholic (read: when he's ended up in Sainsbury's in the alcohol aisle), Crowley goes to some remote park outside of London and sits there for an hour or so. On this particular night, bottle of Torres in hand, he takes the Bentley and he drives out of London, west towards Salisbury. Officially, it's a two hour drive to Stonehenge from where he is.

Also officially, Crowley has never much cared about the little things like that. He simply wills it to be a half an hour journey, and so it is.

He gently shuts the car door when he gets there, carrying his bottle of wine, and he saunters over to the giant slabs of stone, taking a moment to brush a hand against their surface before hoisting himself up onto the top of the tallest one. He crosses his legs, stares up at the inky darkness above him. The melancholy in his chest seems to deepen.

The stars stare back down at him, cool and bright and so very far away. Crowley's fingers tighten slightly around the bottleneck, slacken again.

It had been Crowley who had placed the stars up in the sky, back at the beginning of creation. Time at that point had not yet started properly, things just _were_. The night sky had been an endless dark void, formless save for the one white speck that was the moon. The other archangels had been fine with leaving it like that, but Crowley had thought differently.

While they had worked on the ground below, sculpting the mountains from clay and forming the trees from soil, Crowley was in the endless dark. Painstakingly, he had peppered tiny pinpricks of light across the sky. He stole lumps of the clay and soil, formed them into imperfect spheres and hung them far from the archangels' perfect world and surrounded them with lights. He traced the constellations into shapes to resemble some of the newborn animals on the Earth – the Lynx was the first, Crowley thinks, or maybe Corvus – with such great care that it left silver dust on his fingers. When he watched the birth of a newborn star, exploding in bright lights of white and yellow and bright bright red, red settled in his hair like stardust.

He created the stars, and nothing can take that away from him, not Heaven and not Hell and not God's ineffable plan.

Crowley has to look way for a moment, uses that pause to open the bottle and have a swig, collects his thoughts. Sometimes, it hurts to look at them for too long.

Even long after he had Fallen, he had still continued to add to his patchwork masterpiece. When humans began to sail the seas, Crowley painted Ursa Major and Ursa Minor at the northernmost point in the sky, based on a mother bear and her cub he had come across on his travels. In those new constellations, he made sure that a few of the stars were brighter than the rest, with the north star being the brightest of them all. He fixed it in place so that no matter where the humans were, they would always find their way home.

He'd once met a girl and her mother, about three thousand years ago. (Or maybe more. Crowley's lost track of time, if he's being honest.) The mother had been so proud of her daughter's beauty, and the daughter had been so fierce and brave that she had been prepared to die to defend their village. In the end, they had both died, trying to protect the other. Crowley had painted their forms into the heavens, and then told a storyteller their names and some vague information. In the end, Cassiopeia and Andromeda were immortalised as royalty, myths told over firelights, but their names kept alive.

And before that, he'd met a pair of twins, golden-skinned and wild, born on an island in the Aegean Sea. They'd lived within nature – oh, Aziraphale would _not_ cope with that now – and had been the quickest shots with bows he'd ever met (the record has yet to be filled). When he'd placed them in the sky to watch over everything and murmured their story in the ears of Homer and the local storytellers of Delos, he didn't expect them to become gods in the eyes of the ancient Greeks, but he was happy that the two kids were being remembered.

Crowley blinks again, forces himself to look away from the unblinking lights. He can see the Twins tonight, staring down at him from so very far away. He wonders if they're judging him. Probably. He'd judge him. He has another swig of the bottle and eyes the stars again. How many of those stars are still there, he thinks. The ones he made at the very beginning. He wonders if the red star he made is still there, still shining brightly all that distance away. He never could get that red stardust out of his hair (never really wanted to, if he's being honest).

There's the sound of a low whirring of an engine, coming from somewhere behind him, and Crowley turns to see who it is because _what in the name of Hell who is here at this time of the night?_ More than that, who the hell is _driving_ on grass? The road is to the left of them, and yes alright Crowley had driven on the grass to get here (along with on the pavements and through several farms) but that's beside the point.

To his surprise, the engine whirr belongs to a bike – well, that's being overly generous. It's more like a moped, to be honest. To his even bigger surprise, it's not some little lost pensioner that steps off the bike, but Aziraphale. Crowley raises his eyebrows in disbelief, and Aziraphale gives him a smile and a little wave.

"Hello, Crowley," he greets, rather cheerfully, as though meeting up with rogue demons in spots of ancient worship in the middle of the night is something he does often.

Crowley nods in return. "Angel," he replies, raising a hand. It happens to be the hand holding his bottle of wine. Neither of them mention it.

Aziraphale pulls a book out of his coat and raises it slightly. "I – um – I was rather hoping for some company…" he trails off, his face adorably hopeful. "And the night is rather beautiful tonight, isn't it?"

"Yes, I suppose it is," Crowley murmurs, casting another look over the unblinking stars. A look at Aziraphale's hopeful face, and Crowley shifts up slightly on the giant stone. Aziraphale's face immediately lights up, and Crowley thinks that his expression then is brighter than any of the stars that he's ever made, including the north star. After a moment of awkward clambering, Aziraphale is sat beside him on the stone, looking out at the stars with him, book in his lap. For a moment, there is silence.

"Tell me about them," Aziraphale says, voice soft.

Crowley glances at him, raises an eyebrow. "Which one, angel?" he asks, lightly snorting. "There's quite a few to choose from." He sees a tinge of pink appear at the top of Aziraphale's cheeks, followed by a small upturn of his mouth. He rather likes it, he decides.

"Um, alright." Aziraphale squints at the darkened horizon for a brief moment, then points at something. "What about that one?"

Crowley removes his sunglasses to better see it, tucking them safely away in the pocket of his jacket, and looks to where Aziraphale is pointing. He nearly smiles when he sees the constellation that had been chosen – of _course_ Aziraphale would pick out a cuddly animal. "Leo Minor." He pauses to take another sip of his drink as Aziraphale studies it in closer detail. "Saw a lion and her cub sleeping one day. They were quite the sight, so I painted them in the sky to be together forever."

Aziraphale hums, looking between Crowley and the lion cub stars. Crowley remembers that lion cub well. It had been a fluffy little thing, all big eyes and big paws, curled into its mother's side. (He won't tell Aziraphale it's from an extinct species, because Crowley himself doesn't like to think about that.) "You seem to do that a lot, Crowley," Aziraphale says, his tone almost musing. A glance Crowley's way, a curl of his mouth, and Crowley is reminded, yet again, that yes, Aziraphale is _just enough of a bastard to be worth knowing_. "The big bear and the little bear… the big dog and the little dog…"

"I don't know what you want me to say," Crowley says flatly, knowing full well what Aziraphale wants him to say. There's a hand brushing against his arm, warm and anchoring amidst this sea of stars, and Crowley has to fight his own face to not smile. "Well, look – you can't split up a parent from their kid! It wouldn't be proper!" He offers a mutinous glare up towards Heaven and mutters, "Just like it's not proper to drown_ living things_."

Aziraphale merely smiles, points out another one. "What about that one?"

Crowley follows Aziraphale's gaze. "Oh, that's Monoceros." He frowns in thought. "After a certain _someone_," but he isn't going to name any names, even if they were responsible for an ineffable plan and irresponsible flood, "decided to flood the place, we lost the unicorns." Crowley shrugs, having another sip. He offers it to Aziraphale, who takes it after a second's deliberation. "Decided to put him up there. Thought that even if no one else remembers him, 'least I do."

Aziraphale is staring at him, his expression startlingly soft. It makes Crowley want to look away, makes him feel like he was staring into the lights of his stars again. "Crowley…" he murmurs gently, trailing off. Whatever he was going to say, he decides against it.

Quickly, and quietly because he's a demon not a heathen, clearing his throat, he points out another before Aziraphale can. "That one there," he says, pointing to a larger, more prominent cluster of stars, "is Taurus. The bull." Aziraphale nods as his gaze follows where Crowley is pointing. "That big cluster of bright ones near the bottom there? Those're the Pleiades."

Aziraphale nods, taking in the sight in wonder. Crowley stares up at the blinking stars, melancholy settling in again.

"There're seven of them, you know. Seven sisters. Their father had fought in a war, and his side lost." Crowley doesn't look away from the stars, but he can feel Aziraphale's gaze on his face even without looking at him. "The father was to be punished harshly, just for picking the wrong side. The sisters were so distraught over it…" Crowley shrugs, half wishing he'd kept the sunglasses on. Not that it'd make a difference – Aziraphale knows him too well, with or without the sunglasses at this point. "So I put them all in the sky, their father included."

Aziraphale's looking at him with that _look_ again, the one that makes the stars seem utterly dull in comparison, and it makes something inside his chest heat up. "What're their names?"

"Well, the sisters are Maia, Electra, Taygete, Alcyone, Celaeno, Sterope, and Merope." Crowley pauses for a second. "Their father's Atlas." He leans back slightly, resting his weight against his palms and feeling the cool breeze ruffle through his hair, like the ghosts of his old friends he's immortalised in the stars. "I mean, yeah, Hesiod took some liberties when I told him their names but…" he manages a small shrug as best he can, given that he's resting most of his weight against his hands, "he's kept their memory alive, and that's what matters to me."

A hand lands across one of his, warm and steadying, an anchor to keep him adrift in his ocean of stars. Crowley feels himself smile and this time, he doesn't bother trying to hide it, lets it linger on his face, open in a way that demons aren't supposed to be. For some _ineffable_ reason, Aziraphale has seen something in Crowley that makes him worth knowing, maybe even worth loving. He doesn't think he'll get used to that.

"Well," Aziraphale says, bringing Crowley's thoughts back to the present. His hand is still over Crowley's, and his arm is a warm weight against his own in the cooling English July night. "Which of them is your favourite?"

"What?" Crowley scrambles for an answer while trying to keep his voice calm as all seven Hells. "Oh, oh. None of them, really." He pulls a face. "Can't really pick favourites, me. Would be like picking between my plants, or my own children."

"Not even _one_?"

To his credit, Crowley tries his damned best to try and ignore the looks being cast his way, but to his own complete lack of surprise, he caves within a moment. Within a put-upon sigh as he glances over at Aziraphale, he goes, "Alright, _maybe_ one."

To be honest, it's worth it as Aziraphale's face lights up again. "Really?" He looks up at the sky, as if expecting Crowley's favourite constellation to suddenly appear above them. "Which one, if I may ask?"

"Oh, well. Um, it's called Ophiuchus." Aziraphale doesn't seem to recognise the name, which Crowley sort of expected. It's not a popularly referenced constellation, after all. "Also goes by _the snake charmer_ and _the serpent bearer_," he adds helpfully. He glances up towards Ophiuchus, visible if he turns his head _just so_. Ophiuchus is standing just near to Virgo, and he knows that Leo is watching with her (Crowley knows she's a her, he put her in the stars himself) cub from their other side.

Ophiuchus has always stood with the other zodiac constellations, yet has never fully been part of them, or embraced them.

Crowley twists slightly, not enough to dislodge the warm weight on his hand, but enough to better see Ophiuchus above them. He gestures to the line of stars running through and off to the constellation's side. "See those? That's Serpens, the snake that he's holding."

"Oh," Aziraphale says, and his voice has a strange quality to it. Crowley glances at him out of the corner of his eye, thinks he sees the top of Aziraphale's cheek tinge pink. "What – um – what inspired you to create that one? Ophiuchus?"

There's a pause, as Crowley considers how best to phrase his answer. Does he go for his usual style? Does he go for the sappy, seen in film style? Does he go for – ah, _fuck it_.

"_Well_," he says, more slowly this time. Sure, he might be winging it, but he's refusing to fuck it up. There are two things he knows: gardening, and that he will _not_ fuck this moment up. "It's based on someone, actually. Met him ages ago. Years and years and years and years ago, in fact." Aziraphale is watching him intently. He's so close, Crowley can see the stars reflected in those blue eyes of his. "He took me to get oysters for the first time, it must have been – oh, two thousand years ago?"

"Two thousand and fifty nine, to be exact," Aziraphale says quietly, a small smile on his face.

"Not once has he judged me for being a snake. For my music, yes, but not where it counts." Crowley smiles up at the stars again, the endless ocean above them the only witness to this confession. It seems only fitting that his greatest creations witness his confession to his greatest treasure.

Aziraphale, on the other hand, is looking down at their joined hand, a bit behind them. The book he brought is forgotten, resting beside him. Crowley can just make out in the dark the pink beginning to stain Aziraphale's cheeks. "The snake was very charming and likeable," he murmurs in reply, and Crowley feels that warm glow in his chest again.

He's looking up at the sky again when a kiss is suddenly pressed to his cheek, close to the corner of his mouth. It's chaste, really, a sweet romantic gesture not at all out of place in a romantic film, or the books that Aziraphale seems to like. Yet, it has Crowley turning redder than his stardust coloured hair, blushing to his very core. Aziraphale merely smiles angelically, still holding his hand.

"Lift home, dear?" he says, gently and sweetly and it's like they've been doing this for years. Crowley nods, corner of his mouth tilting upwards, and Aziraphale smiles again, lets go of his hand to clamber down from their giant stone perch.

Crowley watches him carefully for a moment, making sure he doesn't accidentally somehow fall in the process. Once Aziraphale is safely on the ground, Crowley grabs his bottle of wine and jumps down from the stone, only wincing slightly at the impact in his ankles (Aziraphale _is_ there, after all). Another moment, and they're getting in the Bentley, ready to begin the drive back to London.

"What'll you do about your ride?" Crowley asks pointedly as Aziraphale puts on his seatbelt, still ever the stickler. He gestures to the awful moped, still visible in his rearview mirror. He pauses, realises that Aziraphale never picked up the book from the stone again. "And what about the book you brought with you?"

"Hmm?" Aziraphale doesn't look nearly as bothered by the revelation as Crowley expected him to be. "Oh, right!" He snaps his fingers, and in the rearview mirror, Crowley watches the moped vanish into thin air. He glances at Aziraphale.

"What've you done with that?" he asks suspiciously, although his tone lacks any real bite to it, possibly because his cheeks are still aflame. "I don't want a cursed moped miracling down on us halfway down the M25."

"Oh, don't worry, dear, I've taken care of it," Aziraphale says dismissively, adjusting his bow tie in the mirror. His eyes meet Crowley's and he smiles. "I've returned both it and the book to their original owner."

Crowley nods absently as he begins driving. The second he realises what Aziraphale has just said, it takes every bit of his considerable willpower to _not_ slam the brakes there and then, because his dear Bentley deserves better than that. "_What_." It comes out flatter than he intends, but there are suddenly so many questions. "_Original owner_, angel?"

A quick glance over sees that yes, Aziraphale is doing the thing where he fiddles with the frayed edge of his seatbelt. "Well, it's not _really_ stealing, per se. I _have_ given them back." Crowley whips his head around and just stares at him for a solid few seconds. "I only needed it to catch up with you, you see. And, um, I needed an excuse to be here, so I took one of their books as well." Aziraphale pauses and smiles, and Crowley's heart melts just a little bit at the expression. "One that wouldn't be missed, of course!"

"Which book?" Aziraphale suddenly looks embarrassed and mutters something under his breath. "Sorry angel, what was that?"

"I said, the BT Phonebook!"

Crowley stares at him, taking in the way Aziraphale's cheeks have tinged red. He smiles, turns his face back to the road in front of him. "Only you, angel, could steal a moped and the BT Phonebook," he snorts, and Aziraphale thumps his forehead against Crowley's shoulder. Crowley relishes in the feeling, just like he soaks up the warm feeling in his chest when he's around Aziraphale. He'll never get used to this.

He looks back out of the window at the ocean of stars above them, unblinking and bright. Yes, they are his creations, beautiful and bright, telling stories of humans with immortal names. They are his ghosts, lights shining from a millennium ago. He loves them, and nothing can change that. Aziraphale, though, shines brighter than any of those stars, and he loves him more than even the ancient stardust in his hair. He smiles as Aziraphale takes his hand again.

* * *

("I have to ask," Aziraphale asks suddenly, about halfway through journey back. Crowley is driving more slowly, not that he minds. They're somewhere down the M3, the motorway empty save for the occasional passing lorry and Royal Mail delivery vans. There aren't any streetlights this far out, either, so the stars are still bright above them, and Crowley loves that. "Why a crab?"

"Huh?" Well, he isn't expecting that question. "What'd you mean, Aziraphale?"

"Well, I just mean – um – you've got a bull, and a lion, and obviously the twins and a few other people and animals in the zodiac…" Aziraphale starts, fiddling with the seatbelt again. Crowley makes a vague noise, and Aziraphale continues, "So why a crab?"

Crowley glances back over at him, raising his eyebrows. "You got something against crabs, angel?"

"What? Oh, no, of course not!"

"I thought you loved all the Almighty's creations? _All creatures great and small_. All that sorta stuff," Crowley continues, noting the way Aziraphale turns pink again.

"Well, yes, of course I do!" Aziraphale says immediately, nodding his head. He pauses for a moment, though, and he seems to reconsider that stance. "I do have to admit, though, I do question the Almighty's decision about mosquitoes. And possibly wasps." Crowley pulls a face and makes a noise of agreement, because wasps absolutely belong in the seventh circle of Hell. "But still, Crowley, why a crab?"

Crowley looks over at Aziraphale with a small smile again, sees the hopeful expression there, and any thoughts about maybe not telling him crumble away immediately. "It was a crab that made me laugh," he says, rolling his eyes slightly. "Michael made the crabs, thought they looked cute." He lets out a cackle at the memory. "Oh, imagine the expression when one of 'em _immediately_ pincered Michael's hand." Another cackle, and they have his chest heaving from the motions. He's grinning, probably like a maniac, when he looks back at Aziraphale, and says, still slightly breathless with laughter, "You can see why – I mean, I had to put it up there!"

And Aziraphale smiles back at him, the expression soft compared to Crowley's own manic grin, and the warmth in his chest alights again, a reminder that this is real, _somebody loves him_.)

* * *

Author's note: There was a bit of artistic licensing taken with the constellation positions, but I tried to be as accurate as possible with them. The ones talked about (Leo Minor, Monoceros, Taurus, and Ophiuchus) are accurate to the time of year, though.

So, yeah. Hopefully that turned out okay. Please let me know what you thought :)


End file.
